Arrogance

One of the more damning and insulting words in the family dictionary is "arrogant." It's normally used behind the subject's back. In public, it should be deployed guardedly, even by a politician. Generally, when someone tosses around that adjective, the hurler had better be on solid ground and not living in a glass house, or mansion. So it was a bit grating recently to read that billionaire political novice Meg Whitman had called state civil servants "selfish and arrogant" in officially announcing her candidacy for the Republican gubernatorial nomination.

How did David defeat Goliath? According to the Bible, it was because God was on his side. But according to Malcolm Gladwell, it was largely because Goliath had a disorder known as acromegaly, a tumor on the pituitary gland. This disorder, identified in the late 19th century, manifests as gigantism, and it may affect vision. Gladwell lays out his case in his new book, "David and Goliath. " Acromegaly could account for Goliath's unusual size, he writes, and the vision problems it can cause could explain a range of details in the Bible: Goliath's slow movements; his request that David come to him rather than the other way around; his need for an attendant to walk with him onto the battlefield; even the fact that Goliath taunts David by saying, "You come against me with sticks?"

SAN DIEGO - Jon Stewart really needs to be the one writing this column. Ladies and gentlemen, and baseball fans of all ages, we present to you: The Los Angeles Dodgers vs. Sen. John McCain. No spoof. The issue that gripped America on Friday: Did the Dodgers commit a breach of etiquette by jumping in the Arizona Diamondbacks' pool to celebrate the National League West championship? Was this truly a matter of great importance in these United States? Must have been, because the senior senator from Arizona took to Twitter to let his position be known, in no uncertain terms.

I was very interested to read "UCI Eager for Chancellor to End Silence" (April 24) on the new chancellor at UC Irvine, Laurel Wilkening. I was a bit surprised to read that she was keeping a low profile to avoid appearing "arrogant" and "stupid." After 12 years on three University of California campuses, I can safely say that arrogance and stupidity are universal attributes of UC chancellors. Please speak up, Chancellor Wilkening; true arrogance and stupidity take practice.

If the populace is listening closely, the message emanating from all elected officials, at every level of government, is "Let them eat cake." The latest in official arrogance is the Ventura County Board of Supervisors, who, despite the county's precarious financial state, try to justify retaining their perks. Who in the private sector receives seven extra weeks of pay per year? Is this another way of raising their salary, without inciting the public, as they did a few years ago?

What amazing arrogance that Enron Corp. insiders such as former CEO Jeffrey K. Skilling's wife, Rebecca Carter, and former Vice Chairman Mark Frevert would even consider seeking more after they were among the folks who walked away with a combined $25 million ["Ex-Enron Execs Seek Extra Severance," Aug. 13]. Frevert claims it's due him as part of a performance bonus. Federal prosecutors should be asked how soon Enron officials will be indicted for their conduct. Eileen McDargh Elvins Dana Point

Re "'Bad guy' transplants," Opinion, June 6 Gerald S. Levey writes: "But what a tragedy if, because of rumor, suspicion and a lack of understanding about the organ allocation process, people choose not to donate a liver." To which I suggest an appropriate response might be: "What a tragedy if, because of the UCLA medical faculty's arrogance, greed and lack of appreciation of the ordinary California taxpayer, people choose not to donate a liver." Our public universities and hospitals serve California, not some higher calling determined without public scrutiny by god-like, excessively paid, insulated physicians.

Your editorial ("More Arrogance," Oct. 9) only begins to highlight the existing problems that make peace in Central America questionable. President Reagan has tried to make a case that Russia and Cuba will soon have a foothold in our hemisphere. He is so overconvinced of this matter that it has become his vendetta. The fears he expresses are very similar in nature to those expounded by the late Sen. Joe McCarthy in his heyday. If you follow the President's line of reasoning, there will soon be a communist under every bed. Without giving the peace plan time to work, he has from its inception thrown up one roadblock after another to hinder its progress.

Jeffrey Rouder's justifications for his unsafe and illegal actions as a cyclist surely must be a source of frustration for those of us who both ride bikes and drive cars and who therefore have witnessed bonehead moves by both drivers and riders. To claim, as Rouder does, that his convenience justifies actions which run the risk of forcing a driver into a maneuver which threatens drivers, passengers and other cyclists is the height of arrogance. Drivers are no less inconvenienced than cyclists by such impediments as stop signs and traffic lights.

MEXICO CITY - Gary "Gaz" Alazraki was a young Mexican student at USC's film school when the idea came to him to make a movie satirizing his country's nouveau riche and newly powerful. It took him more than a dozen years, but his film - inspired by the American screwball comedies of the 1930s - became a mega-hit in Mexico, taking in 400 million pesos (roughly $32 million) in its first months of release this spring. "Nosotros los Nobles" (We Are the Nobles) tells the story of a wealthy construction tycoon, German Noble; his spoiled, good-for-nothing adult children; and his scheme to pretend he's gone bankrupt to force them - horror of horrors - to get jobs.

PHOENIX - Just when the baseball world thought it had seen everything that Yasiel Puig could become, the Dodgers phenom has added yet another tool. It's not as overwhelming as his bat, or as strong as his arm, but it can be just as powerful - or powerfully destructive - as both. The hot young outfielder and hitter is also now officially a villain. It happened this week in Arizona, where the charging Dodgers swept through the first-place Diamondbacks against a backdrop of boos, accusations and rips.

ISTANBUL, Turkey - What began as local dispute about threatened green space in this metropolis has morphed into a nationwide movement protesting what critics say is the heavy-handed style and increasingly Islamist agenda of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan. After four days of protests, however, the staying power of a spontaneous movement lacking national leadership is far from clear. Erdogan retains substantial support, has his eyes on a run for president next year and seems unlikely to be forced from office.

A giant rock quarry proposed in the hills above Temecula had politicians from one of the most conservative corners of the Inland Empire railing Monday against corporate arrogance and environmental devastation, while union workers pushed the project as a job creator. The political twists are intensifying as the five-year-long controversy over the Liberty Quarry barrels toward a vote before the Riverside County Board of Supervisors, which on Monday held the first of two days of public hearings in a packed convention center ballroom.

With a rich trail of utterances, Newt Gingrich has outlined an opinion of himself that ranges from lofty to stratospheric. In 1985, Gingrich told the Washington Post: "I have enormous personal ambition. I want to shift the planet. And I'm doing it. " In 1994, he told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution: "People like me are what stand between us and Auschwitz. " Just the other day, at the Iowa statehouse, he gave himself credit for helping defeat the Soviet Empire. As Gingrich seeks the GOP presidential nomination here, where the first ballots of the 2012 nominating contest will be cast Jan. 3, Iowans are weighing his long experience, conservative credentials and their hope that he is the Republican who could best President Obama rhetorically.

Through the noise of a Coliseum that roared and rocked for the first time in more than two years, you could hear a page being turned. Through the game's ugly ending, you could see a new beginning. The triple-overtime loss to mighty Stanford on Saturday night felt like the first game of the rest of USC's life, this probation-chained team finally starting to run around like it can smell the freedom, its frustrated fans finally filling the building and bathing it in their passion.

Re "The wrong turf," Opinion, Nov. 16 I don't know which is more insulting, DeBord's ignorance or his arrogance in speaking about his "dream of gentrification" for Glassell Park. With the flippancy of a privileged frat boy, he has reduced an entire community of predominantly hardworking families with complex lives down to a simplistic tug of war between violent street criminals and upwardly mobile consumers. DeBord wants the urban experience -- as long as it's sanitized with a bit of diversity and plenty of shopping.

The arrogance of certain toll road supporters and users absolutely amazes me. We now have Dana Point councilman William L. Ossenmacher being quoted as saying that many motorists are complaining to him because they're getting speeding tickets (July 6). If you're caught speeding, then surely you should get a ticket. Just what exactly are these people complaining about, and why is Ossenmacher feeling sorry for them? Could it possibly be that these arrogant toll road speeders think that they're special, and that the laws of the road don't apply to them?

In 2008, 10-year-old Seth Ireland of Fresno was beaten by his mother's boyfriend and later died of his injuries. Assembly Democrat Henry T. Perea responded with a demand that the state audit his county's child protective services agency plus three others in California, including the Los Angeles County Department of Children and Family Services. There is little point now in arguing whether Perea was merely playing to his Fresno constituents or genuinely seeking constructive change. One way or the other, the audit is on, and if conducted properly it can give the public and county governments valuable information about the performance of four of the state's child welfare agencies.

Midway through the HBO docudrama "Too Big to Fail," the head of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York despairs that ordinary Americans "have no idea the whole thing is about to fall down. " He's referring not to the stock market, which already was plunging as the global financial crisis struck in late-2008, but to the entire U.S. economy as the conflagration on Wall Street threatened to spread far wider. I covered Wall Street for The Times during that period, and the movie accurately depicts the panic that gripped the Fed and the Treasury Department — and eventually a slow-to-comprehend Wall Street — as they scrambled to avert another Great Depression.